What are the responsibilities and job description for the Food Pantry Specialist, FISH position at New Reach?
About New Reach:
New Reach is a 5013c that inspires lasting independence for all people affected by homelessness and poverty through a continuum of housing and support, using the most innovative, progressive, equitable and inclusive methods. Since 1990, New Reach has helped their clients rebuild their lives and establish long-term independence and self-reliance. Their mission is to make homelessness rare, brief, and nonrecurring.
About Food in Service to the Homebound (FISH)
Operating in collaboration with New Reach, Inc., FISH is also a 501c3 nonprofit that has served the Greater New Haven community since 1968. They have helped feed hundreds of thousands of homebound, food insecure individuals, families, and Veterans, delivering free bags of groceries directly to their homes. FISH has shared space with New Reach since 2020. They are committed to alleviating the physical, emotional, and financial stress caused by hunger and because their ideologies and work align so well with New Reach, they joined together to ensure FISH can seamlessly continue to fulfill their mission.
Primary Purpose
The primary purpose of this position is to oversee volunteer onboarding, coordination, and compliance, schedule and carrying out food delivery to clients, create and assign grocery delivery routes, receive and track food donations, maintain a food inventory system, and help overseeing daily bag packing.
Essential Functions:
The Food Pantry Specialist will be expected to work within the community to create relationships with local business, schools, healthcare providers, and other nonprofits, oversee volunteer onboarding, coordination, and compliance-ensure that all independent volunteers and volunteer agencies have signed and submitted waiver of liability. They will create delivery routes for grocery deliveries to clients, help manage daily bag packing at warehouse for grocery deliveries which includes assigning volunteers and other staff support to packing shelf stable, meat, and produce bags.
Qualifications:
A qualified Food Pantry Specialist will have their high school diploma. Preferred qualifications would be having experience with volunteer coordination, experience working with food insecure populations or food pantries, proficient in Microsoft Suite, and have a current CT driver's license and ability to maintain a current license.
Expectations:
New Reach employees are expected to have a solutions-based approach to presented problems, be supportive, engaging and encouraging to peers and staff. They are adaptable to change and willing to take on more responsibility.
Physical Demands:
- The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
- While performing the duties of this job, the employee is occasionally required to stand; walk; sit; use hands to finger, handle, or feel objects, tools or controls; reach with hands and arms; climb stairs; balance; stoop, kneel, crouch or crawl; talk or hear; taste or smell. The associate must occasionally lift and/or move up to 50 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by the job include close vision, distance vision, and the ability to adjust focus.
